


We Create the Headlines

by punkascas (earlwyn)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Activist Castiel, Actor Castiel, Actor Dean, Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst with a Happy Ending, Coming Out, Established Relationship, Homophobia, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Metafiction, Minor Eileen Leahy/Sam Winchester, Nephil Castiel, Reality TV, Undecided Relationship(s), light shade thrown at the show
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-30
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2018-09-13 09:30:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9117844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/earlwyn/pseuds/punkascas
Summary: In which Supernatural is a reality show, Dean Winchester is a closeted reality star hounded by tabloids, and the author gets a little meta.Or: The one where Dean starts to suspect he's a terrible boyfriend, and Cas disagrees.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a part of a write-off challenge with Princess. Go love on her fic [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9118228) or love on her in person at her Tumblr [here](http://profound-boning.tumblr.com/).
> 
> Prompt based loosely on a discussion around my surprise that Channing Tatum is bisexual:  
>  **me:** did channing tatum come out recently??  
>  **me:** i saw [this](http://punkascas.tumblr.com/post/153233892842/leepacey-bisexual-celebrities) and was like HOW HAVE I NOT KNOWN THIS  
>  **princess:** I don't think it was recent tbh  
>  **princess:** It was like one time someone asked him about a story from his past and he's all "oh yeah so my ex boyfriend"  
>  **me:** dljlajd  
>  **me:** omg now i just want the fic where dean is some kind of movie celeb or smth and has struggled with his sexuality for years and hasn't ever even told his family  
>  **me:** but he did date cas long ago when they were kids and they finally reconnect  
>  **me:** and then in an interivew dean is all just like, blah blah my boyfriend  
>  **me:** and acts suuuuuuuuuper chill about it  
>  **me:** even tho inside he's going !!!!!!! I AM DOING A SCARY THING
> 
> Beta graciously provided by Princess and [Mango](http://amazinmango.tumblr.com/). [Come say hi to me on Tumblr!](http://punkascas.tumblr.com/)

He wakes up to PEOPLE magazine open on his side of the bed. A similar article from US WEEKLY greets him in the bathroom, taped to the mirror. The same situation stares back at him when he slides awake the iPad in their small kitchen. Instead of the usual morning recipe for the health crap shakes Sam makes him drink, the homepage to The Ashley's Reality Roundup fills the screen.

The second headline down the page reads: 'SUPERNATURAL' DEAN WINCHESTER'S SECRET GIRLFRIEND? Illustrating the clickbait is a thumbnail of him with his arm around Charlie at the coffee shop they stopped in when he had business in LA last week.

He's clearly holding open the door for her, not that tabloids care about pesky details like that.

So it's nothing. It's fine. Cas knows Charlie. Cas even likes Charlie. She's gay, so she's pretty sympathetic to their whole situation, and she's a damn good line producer. They had to discuss the storyline that's coming out of the editing for the first half of the season, and she prefers doing production meetings in the open-aired caffeine factory she frequents rather than her office.

Nothing. Perfectly innocent. Cas knows they're friends.

Except they don't subscribe to PEOPLE or US WEEKLY or—glancing at the thing wedged into the front door, apparently in case he tried to get the newspaper first—STAR magazine. Cas had to have gone out and bought them all this morning.

Cas can be kind of hard to read at times. Dean can't decide if this is one of those things that should be really obvious or if it falls in line with the usual opaqueness Cas operates under. Do the articles mean Cas has taken some kind of issue with the tabloids reporting about him?

At least Cas left him coffee before disappearing for his morning jog. Maybe by the time Cas is back Dean will have eenie-meenie-miney-moed his way to the correct answer.

Point in favor of there being an issue: Cas is not a morning person. The clock on the stove says it's only gone past five, which means Cas had to not only beat Dean's alarm but functionally work the coffee maker, a task he usually leaves for Dean with a surfeit of squinting and grumbling if Dean isn't getting to it quick enough.

Points against include: well, Cas being Cas, for one. Cas has about two speeds—super chilled or really intense. He doesn't do subtlety, which is good, because Dean doesn't understand subtlety. Dropping hints for Cas means Cas bluntly introducing the new topic into a conversational dead space with no segue or context.

Plus, Cas usually enjoys the tabloids. Dean should probably hire him as some kind of Marketing/PR guy, really, because Cas is the Rain Man of trash celebrity news. He reads literally every article there is about Dean, and then remembers them, even the ones from years ago when the show was constantly on the verge of cancellation. It should be reassuring, knowing he has someone who could legitimately be called his Number One Fan, but mostly it's kind of confusing and anxiety-producing. He'll catch Cas quietly sniggering over his phone when they're driving somewhere, and once he finally snaps, "It's not funny, Cas!", Cas will inevitably show him some photo of him from twenty years ago when he had really bad nineties hair.

"How do you find this shit?" he'll always ask, always stupidly.

"Google," Cas will say, always monotone, like it's obvious.

So what Cas really is, he suspects, is an internet troll, and probably responsible for at least thirty percent of the comments those articles get. Which means having the morning headlines plastered around their house might be nothing more than Cas's idea of a joke.

A weird joke, but still a joke.

 

* * *

 

Their house is only a ten minute drive or so from the bunker, which is a good thing on a shoot day like today when Dean has to be there early enough to reasonably fake that he still lives there. They bought this place three and a half years ago, when he finally worked up the nerve to ask Cas to move in with him and turn what they had into something more official. To be honest, it's still probably closer to Something than Official, but at least now he gets to wake up most mornings to Cas snoring against the back of his neck, and they can usually squeeze in at least breakfast or a late midnight dinner on the days he films, even if they have to do it via Skype. It's so much better this way, seeing Cas every day rather than the handful of days they film together when Cas joins them on hunts. It's more substantial like this, like he finally has something in his life besides Sam that's solid and real.

They're not going to manage breakfast, though, if Cas doesn't get his ass home soon. By the time Dean finishes his coffee, grabs a quick shower, and blends his smoothie, Cas isn't back yet. It's twenty minutes until he has to be on set for call when the back door slams open and in with the cold comes Cas, bearing gifts.

He always looks stupid when he runs in the winter, hat and hoodie and fingerless gloves and stupid, mockable runner's tights. But he's red-cheeked and has ice crystals in his hair and his mouth is cold and sweet when he presses a smug kiss against Dean's mouth. A rolled-up thing smacks Dean in the chest.

"What is this?" Scrambling it open, the front page of TMZ stares back at him, this time with a little cut out of the same photo of him and Charlie from last week and another glaring headline. HUNKY HUNTER'S HIDDEN HONEY. "Oh for fuck's sake, _seriously_? Is there nothing else in the news?"

"No," says Cas, upending the blender to suck down the dregs of Dean's smoothie.

"Where did you even get this?" They live in the middle of Bumfuck, Kansas. There's not a newsstand or Barnes and Noble around for miles.

Cas jerks the faucet onto full blast and jams his head beneath it. "In town."

"Town? That's fifteen miles from here."

"Yes," Cas huffs, and Dean gets one steely blue eye narrowed his way for his troubles.

He holds up his hands in defense. "Okay. Sure. You ran thirty miles this morning. That's normal."

"Inhuman strength," Cas says, twisting beneath the water to rinse off the frozen sweat clinging to the back of his neck. "Nephilim. Grr. Scary."

Dean sighs. "You can't play that card every time you do something like this. You're forty. Ish." Cas's eyebrows go up in mock surprise. "Aren't you?"

"Technically." The water cuts off when Cas pulls his head out of the sink. He uses the tea towel to ruffle dry his hair, and Dean pulls a face. "But forty looks much better on me than it will on you. That's just fact, Dean. Nephilim have a longer lifespan than humans do."

"Yeah, yeah. And bigger dicks."

"It's just fact," Cas says again, but looks quite pleased with himself.

It'd be stupid to ruin a moment like this by asking a question. The kitchen is warm, and Cas _looks_ fine. That has to mean he is fine. Right?

"Hey, uh." Stupid, stupid. He has to leave for work. A smarter man would spend the last few minutes they have kissing and finding all the disjointed places on Cas's skin that either burn bright hot or are still frozen cold. But Cas is already doing that inquisitive bird head-tilt thing in preparation for a question. "All the magazines this morning, you know. That's just you being weird, right? But not like weird-weird. Uh. Right?"

Cas's face is like a solid piece of blank marble.

"Like—bad-weird. Instead of just you-weird," Dean clarifies, hoping that helps.

It doesn't.

After all these years, it seems like he should be able to read Cas better. Technically they've known each other since they were kids. Dean did a summer stint in a boys' home, and even though he doesn't remember this, Cas swears he was there too; that he noticed Dean even back then, when Dean was nothing but a scrawny, scared fourteen year old.

Their first meeting that Dean remembers was in the barn in Bobby Singer's yard. He was twenty-two and Dad had sent him on some errand to Bobby's. He can still feel the way his stomach dropped out when he wrenched the doors to the shed open, and the overhead light went, sparks raining down around Cas's silhouette.

Years later, after Dad died, Cas joined the show as a semi-regular guest. He's a badass hunter in his own right, and the only person Dean would dare trust to work a case alone. It's been clear to him since the first day Cas volunteered to help them that he and Sam need Cas more than Cas has ever needed them. Yet here Cas is, day after day, season after season of their stupid reality show. He could have his own show, or expand his activist work getting SCPA to pass, or even taken up for Bobby after his death. But he doesn't. For some fucking reason, Cas sticks around.

All that history means something. Several somethings, in fact. Cas's rigid loyalty is probably both one of his best and worst traits. The knowledge that Cas won't leave, maybe can't bring himself to leave, forms an anxious lump in Dean's throat the longer Cas's face stays blank and immobile.

Eventually Dean makes this nervous whuffling sound. It's not really a chuckle. "I just mean we're good, right? With all this stuff? The bullshit dating rumors? You and me are still okay." He does the idiot thing of hitting Cas in the chest with the end of the magazine.

Cas looks down at the point of contact and then slowly, slowly raises his eyes to meet Dean's. "Of course, Dean," he says, plain and calm, voice void of any hint of emotion. "When are we not."

Fuck.

"I'm going to take a shower. Have a good day." Cas's shoulder brushes against his as he exits the kitchen. He has a feeling that's going to be the last bit of contact Cas will allow him for the rest of the week.

"Fuck."

 

* * *

 

There's a possibility they may be in a fight.

If they are, the timing couldn't be worse. Everyone is rushing to wrap up the first half of the season before they break for Christmas. Today and tomorrow, Dean and Sam film the last few pickup shots and record the voiceover narration, and then they fly to New York for the review special. Dean hates the guy that does the interviews, a Doctor Crowley. The guy always asks pointless, invasive questions like, "How did that make you feel?" and seems to personally relish any controversy he can stir up between Dean and Sam. Cas usually comes along on trips like that, half because as a member of the show he's contractually invited to attend, and half to keep Dean from peeling off stupid, smug Crowley's face.

Now it feels like there's a chance it won't go that way. Like Cas won't come to New York this time. Like Cas may not even speak with him for the rest of the week. And how fucked up is that? It's Christmas, for fuck's sake. You can't be angry with someone on Christmas.

If Cas even is angry with him.

All morning, as they shoot some breakfast scenes and staged conversations between him and Sam to give context for how the narrative is being edited together, his shoulder muscles ratchet tighter and tighter. It feels like he and Cas are in a fight. There's a tingling beneath his skin, leaving him hyper-aware and irritable. But it's not like Cas yelled at him or anything. And it's probably paranoid and ridiculous to expect Cas to call within the four hours since they last spoke. Hell, it's not like Cas has anything else to do today, as far as Dean knows, so there's a chance he just went back to bed.

He tries calling Cas during their mid-morning lunch break, but he doesn't answer.

That's nothing. That's fine. He doesn't expect Cas to be at his beck and call or anything like that. So he didn't answer his phone. Big deal.

They stop to refuel with coffee in the early afternoon. Cas still doesn't answer. It's starting to seem kind of petty now. The silent treatment is fucking juvenile—Dean knows, because it's one of the tactics he'll default to when they're arguing. If they're arguing. Cas won't even fucking tell him that much. Dean isn't good at relationships, and Cas knows that. Cas knows he usually has no fucking clue what's going on when it comes to stuff like this unless someone spells it out for him.

If you're upset with me, he texts when they open the bunker's kitchen to craft services for the crew to grab dinner, can you just fucking say so?

nt upset, Cas texts back almost immediately, no capitals or punctuation like he can't be bothered. Like Dean is such an evil bastard, apparently, he doesn't deserve correct grammar. Never mind that that's always been Cas's style.

Yeah. Sure. Convincing, Dean replies. Then, three minutes later, What's your problem, man? You know Charlie. You know she's cool.

It's not until hours later, when they're setting up for a few night shots outside, that he gets a reply. They're doing a quick walk-through of the conversation he and Sam will be having, so the camera can follow them smoothly while they have their heart-to-heart under the moonlight, like they totally do this all the time. So at least it's not ruining actual footage when his phone buzzes in his pocket. Their executive producer, Chuck, who is permanently short and frizzy and frazzled, still almost has a panic attack.

"Your phone should be off on set, Dean," he wheezes, like he doesn't get a million phone calls all day long that threaten to mess up the sound recording.

"Yeah, yeah." Dean waves off his complaints and disappears around the dark side of a tree to check his phone.

He doesn't need to unlock it to read the message. The preview says enough.

i dnt hve a problem w charlie

_But I do with you_ lingers in the empty space where the period should be. Dean can read it like a sucker punch to the gut.

 

* * *

 

The shoot runs late that night. Maybe a little intentionally on Dean's part. Sam keeps shooting him dirty looks signaling that he wants to get home to Eileen, but Dean wants to make sure they got this right. Their show might be nothing more than shitty reality television but he wants to make sure it's still good shitty reality television. The show has been part of his life for longer than just about everything else except hunting, and it means something to him. He knows he's awarded way more say in the final product than most reality stars. Cas would say he's just more mouthy than any other reality star, with too many opinions on lighting and editing and narrative. And maybe that's true, but this is Dean's life here. Approximately. There's a few things he's kept off the show, like Bobby's funeral or Cas's status as a supernatural creature, anything that's too personal or too dangerous or that doesn't need a hundred comments on social media judging it. That means that sometimes they have to go that extra step to fill in blanks.

Charlie stops them before it hits midnight. Sam is out the door and headed back to his house before Charlie can say more than a tentative, "Why don't we stop for the night?"

She rests a gentle hand on Dean's arm, keeping him in his seat in the library, while she slides into the chair across from him that Sam vacated.

"Hey, favor from star to producer, okay? If you're trying to drive yourself to burn out, can you wait, like, a week until we wrap? I'm going to need you on your game bright and early tomorrow for the voice over stuff."

He manages to wrangle up a small smile for her. "So you're saying postpone the mental breakdown?"

"Yeah. Or, you know, skip it altogether by telling your awesome friend Charlie what's up so she can give you some of her patented excellent advice."

"I don't even know what there is to say." He sighs and rubs at his face, figuring it doesn't hurt to give it his best shot. "Cas and I might be having this fight. About the tabloid photo of us. I think."

Charlie frowns. "You're not sure?"

"No," he says, probably a little too strongly, given how Charlie leans back in her chair. "I don't know, man. I probably should know but—just—it's Cas."

"And you guys never fight?" Charlie suggests, one eyebrow raising dubiously.

Dean huffs a weak laugh. "No, actually, we fight all the time. But that's, like." He bites his lip. "I don't know," he decides eventually. "Disagreeing has always been a thing between us. But this feel different. This is something I don't even know if we actually disagree about. Or if it's more like—we should disagree, but Cas isn't holding up his side of things. So he's just staying quiet and pretending it's okay when it isn't."

"Do you think he's lying to you about something?"

And that's the kicker, isn't it. If there's one thing he can't deal with, it's being lied to or kept in the dark. He and Cas have too much baggage in that area—hell, so do he and Sam—to believe Cas doesn't know it's an issue by now. Since they moved in together, Dean has tried to be more forthright about things, about what he wants and what his limits are. He wants the same from Cas.

"Do you think Cas is happy being with me?" he whispers into the dark quiet of the library, the filming lights already turned off for the night.

Charlie smacks his arm, startling him. "Cas loves you, you big doof."

And yeah. He smiles a little, because he knows that. He doesn't have the greatest grip on it at all times, but intellectually he knows, and he's trying to get better at holding that belief as strong and sure as his conviction that he loves Cas back. That's not the issue.

"Yeah," he says quietly. "But do you think he's _happy_?"

The thing is, it's easy to love someone more than you love yourself. For years, that's what defined his relationship with Dad and with Sam and even Bobby. He needed them more than they needed him, and so the sacrifice was obvious. There wasn't another choice. He had to live off the love he felt for them, and if he didn't feel any back at times, well. You learn to survive on table scraps.

They've never had a conversation about whether Cas struggles to believe Dean loves him back.

When he glances up at Charlie, her eyes are sad and sympathetic but not judgmental. _Charlie loves me too_ , he realizes suddenly. He's considered her the little sister they never had for years, but it never occurred to him to wonder how much of that was reciprocated. The fact she hung around was always enough.

"I think that's a question you have to ask him," she says softly. "Go home, Winchester. Go talk to your boyfriend."

His facial muscles spasm before he can help himself. "Cas isn't my _boyfriend_."

Charlie just rolls her eyes. "Whatever. Go talk to your half-human, half-angel, coffee addicted, cat-loving, sexually-romantic roommate person thing."

 

* * *

 

 _Sexually-romantic roommate person thing_ is probably not a bad way of describing the thing he and Cas have going. They live together, and even with Dean's work schedule, Cas's interest in sex means they rarely go more than a couple days without at least someone having an orgasm. And there's feelings. There's definitely feelings. For other people, boyfriend is probably the shorthand for that kind of thing. But Dean has always spooked at that word, both for professional reasons and personal. Hunting culture isn't the most accepting, and just like they keep the fact that Cas isn't human off the show, Dean makes sure their relationship never appears more than a brothers-in-arms kind of deal.

A few years ago, they tried to let more of a friendship show in the edited versions of the material, but that led to a bunch of uncomfortable speculation online and really just ended in a shit-show for everyone involved.

Cas is a divisive presence in their fan base, some people loving him and some people hating him. Honestly, to a ridiculous extent. Dean was climbing up the walls that summer from all the commentary that was coming out online and in the tabloids. Cas has said there's people out there who "ship" them, whatever that means, but there's also people that went apoplectic because everyone knows the person Dean really wants to bang is his little brother, which: no. He already strains under the amount of scrutiny they get just on the normal aspects of the show. Having a bunch of strangers feeding him their opinions on what his relationship with Cas should be, might be, could be is just too much. None of it's an accurate reflection of what Cas is to him. Hunting isn't the type of lifestyle that allows for the most stable of relationships, and being on television is a double whammy in that regard.

They're fragile. Or maybe it's more that he's fragile. There's so few things he's had in his life, things he could count on, and he wants to keep Cas as one of those. As though keeping their real relationship a secret protects it somehow.

Or maybe it's just been protecting Dean, and Cas feels otherwise.

 

* * *

 

It's past midnight before he pulls into the driveway of their small farm house. It was a fixer-upper when he bought it, a full month before he worked up the courage to ask Cas to move in with him, but it has everything they need at this point. They spent months updating the kitchen and the plumbing and rewiring the whole place so that Cas stopped overloading the circuit board anytime Dean made him come so hard he lost the tight-fisted self-control he keeps over the filaments of Grace threaded through his soul. Now there's a flower garden out by the back porch that blooms in spring, and fruit trees that yield apples along the back fence, and a vegetable garden that Cas harvests every fall to sell at the local farmer's market. There's a swing on the back porch where they can sit on humid summer nights and drink beer, and hideous orange shag carpeting in the bedroom that Dean can't bring himself to hate because Cas adores the way it squishes between his toes.

It's their place. Allowing cameras in here to see how he and Cas really live—who they really are when they're not playing the exaggerated caricatures of themselves for the benefit of the viewers—it would destroy everything. The longer the show's been on air, the more he's realized how much he needs space to just be himself, his real self. He can be that person with Cas, and in their house. It's where he feels safe.

He doesn't know how to have that kind of discussion with Cas. It was something he thought Cas already understood—knew and accepted and, like Dean, even preferred it that way. Cas has always known him better than he knows himself. He's surprised Cas never asked him why he waited so long to get the house, to move in together. To Cas it was probably obvious years ago that that's what Dean was missing and he just didn't know it.

He's still struggling for a way to introduce the conversation he thinks they likely need to have when he pushes open the front door. His mind is blank of good opening lines. _We need to talk_ is just too cliché, and asking out of the blue if Cas gets something out of their relationship feels too awkward and abrupt. And probably won't get him any kind of useful response, truthful or not.

In times like this, it'd be really helpful if Cas came with some kind of decoder ring. Cas doesn't lie outright. He'll say when he thinks, usually without any semblance of tact or emotional intelligence. But Cas also omits things, sometimes on accident because he still struggles with things like context and social norms. But it's also something he does on purpose, times when he doesn't think it's something Dean should know, or when he's feeling guilty or ashamed or insecure.

If it turns out Cas isn't happy, that's something Dean needs to know. What the fuck he's going to do about it, he has no fucking clue. But he's at least got to attempt to ask.

His motivation takes a hard hit while he's tiptoeing quietly through the living room, just in case Cas is already sleeping in the bedroom, when he suddenly zeros in on the lump on the couch under the blanket.

"What the hell," he croaks, coming to a stop by the arm of the couch.

Cas nudges his head out from under the blanket, blinking owlishly and hair stuck up every-which-way from how he's been sleeping on it. "Yes?"

His mouth works a couple times before he squeeze real words free. "You're sleeping on the couch now?"

Cas shuffles a single shoulder around a shrug, "You seemed . . . stressed," he offers, choosing his words carefully. "On the phone. I thought you'd want space."

"No," Dean sputters, and watches Cas's eyes grow round in surprise, face otherwise blank like it was this morning.

"No?"

" _No_. Of fucking course not!"

The whole reason behind buying this place was so that Cas could legitimately spend the night. That they can wake up together, in the same bed, limbs tangled and the air under the blanket stifling from shared body heat. Before, Cas had his own room in the bunker, a guest room Cas never put much effort into making look like his own, all concrete and no windows and depressing to look at, depressing to sneak out from at four in the morning before the cameras got there so no one would notice anything. This is the one place they don't have to hide. Where they don't have to be That Hunter and The Sidekick. This is their home.

"Okay," Cas says.

Dean waits, but that's all the response Cas generates. He looks—well, cute, actually. Not the same as when you startle Cas out of a deep sleep; that's all growls and thin-slit eyes and nearly walking into the walls until you pump the first two cups of coffee into him. This is Cas when you pull him out of some daydream contemplation, all wide-eyed and flushed and softened around the edges. It's time like these that all Dean wants to do is crawl on top of him and stick his face into Cas's neck, forcing Cas to give him some of his body heat and that weird, vulnerable innocence he keeps despite all the death and destruction they've witnessed. That they've been personally responsible for sometimes.

And he can't. He can't, because Cas is looking at him like Dean is speaking some crazy foreign language and that the best way to calm an insane person is to act doubly calm yourself.

"I don't want space," he grits out, fingers curling into fists at his sides.

"Okay," Cas says again, just his chin poking out from beneath the blanket.

Dean can't fucking stand it. All day Cas avoided his calls, and refused to give him any kind of straight answer, and now he's taken it upon himself to make sure they won't sleep together tonight. That's a fight. That's all the classic signs of a fight, and the stupid neutral baby bird act isn't the way to fight fair.

"Stop fucking acting like that's news!"

He wants—he needs—Cas to have some kind of emotion. To shout back at him. Instead Cas just cocks his head to one side, blinking slowly.

"Isn't it?"

"No!" he roars, an explosion of sound that holds all of his frustration and anxiety from the entire day.

But Cas still isn't getting with the program. He isn't narrowing his eyes like when he gets suspicious. He isn't jutting out his jaw like when he's being stubborn and defensive. He's just fucking sitting there. This isn't how you have a relationship. This isn't supposed to be them. There were years when Cas was quick off the mark with him, arguing with him and pushing at him and defying him as much as Cas defied the boundaries of what supernatural creatures were meant to be. That was followed by years where Cas retreated from him, when the only glimpses he got into how bad things were inside Cas's head were from snatches of conversations in private. The guilt Cas felt, and the self-hatred, and the miasma of loss that followed him around like a dark cloud—and Dean could only keep begging, keep trying, keep reaching out in the few poor ways he knew to get Cas to come back to him.

They're supposed to be past that now. They're supposed to have fixed all that.

"It's not news," he tries again, softer this time. He wants to touch Cas but he can't bear to feel Cas jerking away from him. Instead he throws his arm around the room, gesturing at nothing in particular. Maybe just their house in general. Their life in general. "And neither is—fucking having coffee with Charlie. I don't know why they write that shit. They're just stupid tabloids, man. They've been doing it since we started the show. It comes with the territory. Why does it have to be this big fucking deal breaker all of a sudden?"

And if his voice cracks on that last part, shit. They're just going to pretend it doesn't.

At least Cas has the kindness to turn his head away this time. "It's not," he murmurs, plucking up pills on the scratchy army blanket he rescued from the closet. "A deal breaker. It never was."

"Yeah?" His chest hurts from something. From breathing too hard, maybe. From how much it feels like something's slipping through his fingers, except he can't see it and he can't touch it, so he has no hope of catching it before he loses it forever. "Then what?"

Cas gives a sharp jerk of his head. "Then fucking—nothing, Dean." And at least that's something. That's some emotion, the glare Cas gives him. "What do you want me to say? I'm not upset. I'm not—anything."

He wants to argue, but Cas stops him by continuing.

"I—I know who you are. I know what I chose when I . . . when I chose you. And I still do. Fuck everything else. I choose you. You're everything to me."

Dean breathes. In and out. That should be comforting. Cas loves him. Cas is loyal. Those should be good things. But put like that, it doesn't—it doesn't _feel_ like a good thing. He doesn't want to be everything to Cas if it means Cas gives up everything else for him. That's not—okay. Sam would probably have better words for it, like healthy and equitable and fulfilling. It all boils down to the same thing.

The pain right below his sternum pushes up a thick lump into his throat. "Jesus, man, do I even make you happy?"

Cas is quiet. He stares down at the blanket covering his lap. That's probably the only real answer Dean needs. Cas's words just cement it into concrete. "Happiness isn't the point of life. You know that."

"It is when we're—you know." He flaps his hand between them. They love each other. They live together. He can't imagine his life without Cas, without this house. Or he can, but fuck, he doesn't like the picture it paints.

"When we're what, Dean?" Cas asks, simple and straightforward, but there's that chin coming up, the challenge good and clear. "Say it."

Dean hates the word boyfriend. On the show, Cas appears in maybe one out of every five episodes, and even then for only a few minutes at a time. The rest of the world has no idea what Cas is to him, and from that, no good idea of who Cas even is. They always cut those scenes, the ones where Cas uses his superior strength or affinity with Enochian magic to get them out of a tight corner. Just last week in LA, he had Charlie instruct the post-production team to drop a few more scenes between him and Cas because they treaded the line too closely, the line that brings into doubt that Cas might be anything functionally more than an extra gun, a side character in Dean Winchester's life.

"I love you," he manages, weak-voiced and failing.

That has to mean something. All of his life, he's feared how it might not mean anything to anybody. His love never saved Dad, never saved Bobby. It never kept Sam from running from him. Cas is the first person he started to let himself believe it mattered to.

"I know," Cas says, his eyes focused back on the couch, on his knees under the blanket, on the coffee table next to him. Anywhere but Dean. "I know you do—your best."

And Jesus. _Jesus_.

What Cas really means is that, whatever Dean feels, it's not enough. Cas is never going to say that, though. He doesn't know if Cas even can, if that's the sort of thing he'll admit even to himself. Cas lives his life on the principle of regret. The smaller the amount of regret, the better they're doing. A life without regret, without pain or sacrifice or turning your back on something once you've sworn to it, he's not sure Cas knows how to do that.

If he did, it's pretty obvious he wouldn't still be here with Dean.

He can't stay here. He can't go sleep in their bed, alone, and pretend things will be okay in the morning. Cas probably would. The next morning Cas will probably be the exact same as he's always been, grumpy and belligerent until there's coffee, and cuddled up to Dean's back catching the last few moments of sleep while Dean fights with the coffee maker. Cas would probably smile and razz Dean and kiss him like Dean's the most intoxicating drug he's ever had in his life and he can't get enough.

Dean can't be something Cas is addicted to. Dean can't be Cas's chosen method of self-destruction, the sufficient because Cas has no hope of getting the best.

He still has his coat on, and his old room still exists in the bunker for when they film there. Turning on his heel, he heads for the door, shoving down the tears prickling at his eyes so no one will see them.

"That's not good enough," he says right as he leaves.

He's not good enough.


	2. Chapter 2

He wakes in the morning before the crew arrive. Waking up at five in the morning is a hard habit to break, especially when his dreams are hazy, unfathomable things that feature Cas's face, alone in their house each day while Dean is gone, and an aching pulse of loneliness clouding everything.

They have a small recording studio in one of the back storage rooms. The skeleton crew they need for sound recording start to filter in at a much more reasonable eight o'clock, and Dean surprises them by cooking breakfast. Bacon, eggs, hash browns, fresh-made coffee—craft services usually has a decent spread of bagels and muffins, but nothing beats a home-cooked meal.

Charlie bounds up to him as if she's dying to ask how talking to Cas last night went, but one look at his face is enough to send her veering off course towards the coffee maker as if that had been her intention all along. Sam gives him a curious, concerned look when he rolls in fifteen minutes before they're meant to start, but Dean waves him off. He doesn't want to talk about anything. He just wants to do his job and make it through the rest of this stupid week.

Doing the narration segments is one aspect of the job Dean doesn't hate. It's not his favorite part of the job—that's always when they're filming the hunts, when he can focus on his real job and not on the cameras. But it beats the hell out of the forced conversations he's meant to have with people to pad out each episode, the heart-to-hearts with Sam or the awkward moments Kevin or Cas are supposed to come up to him and ask him how he feels about some situation that just happened. Voice over work is still taking other people's words and regurgitating them back, but they give him a script for this part and there's no camera on his face detailing every minute micro-expression for the internet to mock or over-analyze.

This script is for the B-roll of the first six episodes of the season. Sometime in January they'll start filming the second half of the reason to air next fall.

He spent four days in LA last week with Charlie going over the main arc the editors are attempting to piecemeal together from the footage. The arc itself he feels comfortable with—watch the Winchesters try to save the world! Again! Once more with feeling! It's old hat, and he can't figure out why the audience hasn't grown bored of them yet, but, hey, each year the ratings prove good enough to get their contract renewed for another season. The majority of notes he had for Charlie were limited to scenes he wanted dropped from the reel or tweaks to scenes that he thinks show an unfair portrayal.

Eileen doesn't like being filmed, so he had the producer cut the small scene she has with Sam, even though it's a cute moment of Sam stumbling through beginning sign language with her. They also cut a few lines where he was coming across more of a dick than he realized at the time, and one actually hilarious scene of Cas half-ranting, half-lecturing about the metaphysics behind a certain spell. Dean spent the entire time making exaggerated bored faces behind Cas's shoulder, and when Cas caught him they got into a minor wrestling competition.

It was a little sad to lose, but their viewers don't care about the mathematical equations behind magic. He and Sam decided early on that they're not an educational show—too much risk of some punk kid glorifying their life and getting themselves slaughtered the first hunt they go on—and even with his excellent silent mockery, it proved a little too dry to fit their tone.

Secretly, for personal reasons, he also didn't want Cas to get the idea—when Cas watches the episode later, because he will—that he finds Cas's diatribes boring or unnecessary. Because Cas had to learn to deal with supernatural ability at such an early age, and largely on his own from the little Dean's been able to shake out from Cas about his childhood, Cas is fucking brilliant at understanding magical forces and how they sync together. It's great. He respects Cas's knowledge, both for its use and for the amount of work Cas put into developing it. Unfortunately it's just not what their show is about.

He makes it through the first two episodes without much issue. Most of his job at this point requires little more than sitting in front of a microphone and a stand that holds his script, and reading introductions and segues between scenes that otherwise would seem a little disjointed spliced together like that. It's monotonous and familiar, and in a way almost relaxing. All he needs to do is focus on getting the words from the page to his mouth, while the rest of his brain whirs around nothing. He does four takes of "Previously on Supernatural . . ." and "Next time on Supernatural . . ." so that between him and Sam, the editing team has something to pick from.

Episode Three is where the trouble starts. Cas guest stars in this one, and even though it was nearly six months ago that they filmed this, he still remembers that hunt too well. It was a difficult one. They all took a beating, and in the end, they lost the old woman they were trying to save. Cas stayed with him on the couch in the library for hours after they got back to the bunker, offering reassurance and soft words. It devolved eventually into Dean's head against Cas's chest and Cas stroking through his hair, reciting every bad pun he could think of, which turned out to be only five.

It's the kind of thing you do for the person you love. Cas was warm and solid and indisputably there, which was what Dean needed in that moment. While in LA, he ordered them to cut that scene almost entirely, leaving just the beginning when Cas comes into the room and puts his hand on Dean's shoulder, murmuring condolences.

The script calls for him to address what a good team member Cas is, and then to segue to the next scene set the next morning after Cas has disappeared and he and Sam debrief in the kitchen how the hunt went last night. It makes Cas's role on the show little more than back-up when those heroic Winchester brothers can't cut it on their own, and a single voice to absolve Dean of responsibility for the people who died or suffered. Even though it is his fault. The decisions he made, decisions that prioritize getting a job done over the welfare of the people they most directly impacted, he should carry that responsibility on his shoulders.

Leaving the edit the way it is now misses so much of who Cas is. Cas is amazing, on the field and off it. He's funny, in his own way of off-kilter dry humor. He's irreverent and stable and the most compassionate one of the three of them, even though he's been through just as much shit as they have, if not more.

He's not a team member. He's not just a soldier under Dean's command. He's not, for fuck's sake, Dean's friend.

But to the public that's all he looks like. After that miserable summer with social media a few years back, Dean requested that the producers limit the amount of screen time he and Cas shared together, just to be safe. It's hard for them to be in the same room and not to vibe that something. Not to let their true relationship begin to peek through the cracks in every look and every touch and every word they exchange. He didn't want that on the screen, a million people watching and gossiping about what it means. They're never going to get close to what Cas actually is to him.

Now, looking at the footage, he's not sure the Cas that appears on the show comes across as a person at all. With every slice from the reel, Cas's screen time becomes more and more superfluous, disconnected from what Dean and Sam are doing, misleading about how much _persona_ Cas possesses.

In the short break for their sound tech to reset audio levels, he breaks out his phone and shoots Cas a quick text. Given that Cas didn't try to contact him since he left last night, he doesn't expect an answer. There isn't an answer Cas can give that could fix this anyway.

Five words is all it takes. You deserve better than me.

 

* * *

 

They fly to New York on the redeye the next morning. A niggling, hard-to-squish plea of hope wriggles in the back of his head, as much as he tries to ignore it, that maybe Cas will surprise him. Even after they call for last boarding, and Sam is calling to him from the boarding gate, Dean keeps his eyes peeled for Cas's recognizable slouched shoulders shuffling to the gate, disgruntled and sleepy-eyed because he didn't hear the alarm in the morning. But present. Here, with Dean, like they should be..

He carries the frail strand of hope even after he's seated across from Sam in the aisle seat, the window seat next to him where Cas should be instead holding only his travel duffle. The stewards announce for everyone to take their seats as they're closing the door, and then the plane is taxiing towards the runway, the safety presentation playing muffled through the Metallica playlist Dean has jammed in his ears.

They change planes in Atlanta. He doesn't bother turning his phone off airplane mode. If Cas isn't coming to New York, then chances are slim he's decided to reply to Dean's text in the last two hours.

Dean hates New York—hates all big cities, in fact, with their noise and the seas of people to push through and the buildings blocking you in, hiding the sky. Cas made the city much more tolerable, dragging Dean out places like Central Park or tiny hole-in-the-wall ethnic restaurants where Dean ate food he would have never guessed could be considered food. Once, last year, Cas took him to Rockefeller Center to ice skate beneath their Christmas tree. Despite swearing he'd never done it either, Cas was a natural on skates, graceful and balanced and sharp, while Dean flailed around, clinging variously to the sideboards or Cas's shoulder for dear life. Despite knowing he was going to fall and crack his skull open and die, the most vivid memory from that night Dean has is Cas laughing—his real laugh, the one that comes from deep in his chest and sounds more like a schoolboy giggle. He didn't need the lights around the rink or the tree at the far end to illuminate the night. Cas's grin did that all on its own.

This trip he doesn't feel like going anywhere. What's the point? Nothing's the same without Cas. He wants to hold onto those memories, even if they're lies.

They're not scheduled to return to Kansas until Sunday, having Friday for the interview session with Crowley, and then Saturday for photo shoots to advertise the new season when it premiers in a few months.

That means the first day is nothing more than a travel day. Once he checks into the hotel, Dean heads straight for his room, showers off all the anxiety sweat from the plane, and changes into his most comfortable sweats and a t-shirt. It's one of Cas's shirts, a beat-up, long-sleeved mustard monstrosity Cas bought when they visited Wall Drug in Wall, South Dakota. An impromptu road trip following a successful hunt near Bobby's led them past the signs and they wound up too curious to pass up the opportunity to investigate. Wall Drug turned out to be a bizarre tourist trap, the entire place comprised of kitschy decorations and surreal collections of statues, shops, and restaurants, replete with a giant, saddled jackalope that stood at least 20 feet high. It made no sense to Dean. It makes no sense to anybody, he suspects. But it made Cas's eyes light up.

"It's a metaphor for the human condition, Dean," Cas kept insisting, prodding at him to get up on the jackalope with him so they could get their picture taken. "Pointless, nonsensical, yet oddly beautiful. Do I need to get down and lift you up here? Because I'll do it."

That's one of the scenes that never made it onto the show.

Dean settles into the king bed that's too big for just one person, and flips through one of the eighty cable channels the expensive hotel provides free of charge. When he gets hungry, he orders room service, not at all interested in braving New York's streets to find something cheaper.

 

* * *

 

Forty minutes later, the knock comes to the door to tell him his food has arrived. But when he opens the door to tip the bellboy and help him roll the food cart into the room, his gargantuan baby brother fills the doorway instead. Behind, the silver handle of the cart glints in the hallway lights.

"Didn't know you worked for the hotel," he says, not the warmest of welcomes.

Sam has his hands in his pockets and sways forward onto his tiptoes, making him even more preposterously taller than Dean when all he's wearing is socks. "Ran into the bellboy in the elevator on my way up to check on you. Thought I'd take over."

Dean scowls, and from the fond, wry twist to the corner of Sam's mouth, it's an expression he picked up from Cas. "I don't need checking up on."

"Maybe, maybe not. You've been in a bad mood the entire day today. Honestly, this entire week so far. So come on. I'm going to be generous by letting you eat your burger first, but then you're going to tell me what's going on between you and Cas."

He's tempted to just close the door in Sam's face. The only thing that stops him is that somewhere along the way, Sam gained like two hundred pounds of muscle on him and a flimsy wooden door isn't going to stop Sam when he has his mind set on something.

"Fine," he snaps, as graciously as he can, and turns back to climb into the bed. Sam wheels the cart into the room, and for once keeps his disturbed expressions to a minimum as Dean eats his burger and fries in bed, scattering crumbs and spilling drips of sauce all over the hotel's pristine white duvet.

They watch some sort of weird antiquing show for the hour Dean eats because Sam likes that sort of thing. Dean only agreed to it with half a mind that it might distract Sam from his original purpose coming here.

But as the outro begins to play, and Dean's empty plate has been crusting on the food cart for twenty minutes, Sam clicks off the remote and turns on the bed to face him, stubborn and sympathetic in equal measure. "Okay, spill. Let's hear it."

Yeah, no. He has no desire to pick at that open wound just for Sam's education. Cas is perfect for him, but if he's bad for Cas, then that's it. There's nothing to be done about it. Therefore, there's nothing to be gained from talking about it.

"Is this just because of what Charlie told you? Because it's nothing, okay. It's fine. I'm _fine_."

Sam snorts. "Right. You seem fine. Ecstatic, in fact." He bows his head forward to try to catch his eyes, which is great. Great. Dean has about as much defense against Sam's puppy eyes as he does against Cas's soul-reading stares. "Charlie didn't tell me anything, Dean. This is all me."

"Then how do you know it's about Cas?"

"Because I'm not stupid?" Sam suggests. "Nothing hits you this hard, unless it's someone dying you thought you could save, or you and Cas are having issues."

"Yeah." He grinds his teeth together, buying time, because okay, that's a pretty astute assessment. Not that he knows how to explain any of this. It takes him a moment to gather up the words, clicking in his throat with every swallow. "See, like. The thing is . . . I don't think Cas is really . . . happy. Uh, like. With me. With what we got going."

Sam's face does the same thing Charlie's did, like he's repressing the urge to shake Dean. "Cas loves you," he says finally, all sincere and soulful eyes.

"I know! I know that. Charlie said the same fucking thing. But that's not . . ." He blows out a breath, hard, making his lips vibrate. "That's not the issue. Cas loves me, and Cas wants to be with me, and so even though that means he has to give up whatever else he wants, that's just fine. Except . . . except it's not fine. That's not how things should be. It shouldn't be—Cas gives up his chance to be happy just so I can be."

He doesn't get Sam immediately jumping on him with criticism and advice with the implication that Dean should've been able to figure this stuff out for himself. Sam is frowning, instead, those cogs turning in that big brain of his.

Eventually he asks, "So do you know why Cas is unhappy?"

"No?" Dean tries, flipping an internal one-eighty from wanting Sam to butt out and mind his own business to praying Sam might actually find a solution here. "I mean, it's not like Cas wrote out this list or anything."

A soft laugh tilts up the corners of Sam's mouth. "No. List-making doesn't seem like Cas. Not unless it's just the numbers one through five, and you're supposed to intuit what they stand for."

For what feels like the first time in days, Dean laughs. "Yeah. Sounds like Cas. But I guess, I don't know. Like—I think this current tabloid bullshit is bugging him. The rumors that I'm dating Charlie."

"That's better than the rumors you were dating an Olson twin from a few months ago."

"We happened to be at the same party together," Dean protests. "It's not—those magazines will read anything into anything. All I did was walk her to her car."

Sam holds up his palms up in supplication. "I know. I got it. It was ridiculous. No one who knows you takes that crap seriously."

"Yeah," Dean sighs, and rubs across his chest, palm digging into the space just above his heart where it aches the most. "Except Cas maybe. I don't think he legitimately believes there's something going on. He knows Charlie, knows she has a girlfriend. Hell, she's been the number one pusher to include our relationship as an actual part of the show. If I thought the issue was that he thought I was cheating, I'd just do whatever I had to do to convince him I wasn't."

"So what then?"

"I don't know! I think it's just the whole . . . thing. Everything. The fact that there are rumors every couple months about my sex life. The fact that—I'm not great with wanting people to know. About us. I think he's resigned himself to the fact that this is the way things have to be, and even if it's not what he wants, tough shit. He's settled."

Once again, there's no quick retort from Sam. After a few seconds of silence, Dean risks a glimpse at him. Sam still has that determined, considerate look squishing up his forehead.

" _Well_?" Dean finally has to press.

"Well, what?" Sam shakes his head. "If you don't like that Cas might hate the fact that you have a new suspected girlfriend every three months, and he wants some recognition for what he is to you, then—do that. Change it."

" _How_?" Dean whines, way more petulant and distraught than he'll ever admit to sounding.

Sam shrugs again. "Tell people."

This time it's Dean's turn to roll his eyes. "Oh, yeah, right. And while we're at it, why don't we just mention that Cas is also Nephilim and therefore supernatural and fair game to any hunters who want to try to take him out?"

Hunters targeting him might not even be new for Cas. He's a big advocate for the rights of supernatural creatures, and isn't the fondest of hunters or hunting culture. If there wasn't a mutual hatred towards demons driving him, Dean has no idea how Cas would have ever hooked up with Bobby, and therefore no idea how they would have ever met. 

What Cas's life involved before that afternoon in Bobby's barn form only faint shadows in Dean's mind. For how much Cas knows about his past, he knows extremely little the other way around. In all honesty, he probably has only himself to blame for it. He gets frustrated on a regular basis that Cas won't tell him stuff, but the truth is, Dean never asks. Cas has asked at various points over the years if Dean misses his mom, what she was like, to be regaled with the scant treasured memories he has of her. He doesn't even know Cas's mom's name.

He knows she was a human, not even twenty when she got pregnant. Cas's dad is even more of a mystery, seeing as Cas never met the guy. The only information he had to go while growing up where stories from his mom. The way Cas tells it, according to his mom, his dad was an archangel, and, Cas will always add with a wry twist to his mouth, the sex was fantastic.

He knows Cas was on his own from the time he was a teenager and that being Nephilim freaked him the fuck out for the first part of his life. That he never felt like he fit in anywhere until he met Bobby, when he started teaching Bobby how to hunt demons. Where Cas learned about demons in the first place, Dean doesn't know. He doesn't know if Cas went to school or how many grades he got through before he stopped. He doesn't know where Cas grew up, where he was born, if he got bullied or shamed as the weird kid that could move things with his mind.

That's all stuff he wants to know about Cas, wishes that Cas would tell him. It doesn't seem likely now.

"You're being dramatic, Dean," Sam chides. "You and Cas—you're probably two of the best hunters in the world right now. I think both of you can handle yourselves against anyone who tries to pick a fight with you. And who knows? Television shows with queer couples do a lot better with ratings and popularity these days. You might be surprised how the papers respond. You could actually get a lot of support."

That goes against every instinct Dean has driving him. Gay hunters just don't exist, at least not in public. And sure, he trusts Cas to be able to handle himself in a fight. But that's a long ways from getting actual approval from anyone.

"You don't let them keep any footage with Eileen for the show," he tries as one last feeble defense.

"Yeah," Sam says, "that's because Eileen doesn't want to be on the show. She finds it too stressful. But Cas has been filming with us for eight years, Dean. Cas knows what's involved in that life. And doesn't he read every article already anyway? I can't imagine someone could come up with something he hasn't read before about him or you or the two of you together."

That might be an actually decent point. Still. "I don't know, man."

"What's more important?" Sam asks. "The unknown possibility that you might get more haters online, or actually having the chance to give Cas back what he gives to you?"


	3. Chapter 3

Fuck. _Fuck_. He still can't believe he's doing this. He's standing in the wings for Crowley's show, waiting for Crowley to introduce him so he can come on stage. The crowd cheers and claps when Sam is brought out, and once the roar has returned to a level Crowley can speak over, he beckons Dean to join them on one of the two couches that flank the host chair. Wiping off his sweaty palms on his jeans, Dean plasters on the best smile he can muster and walks out to wave to the crowd.

Once edited together, this episode will only include around forty-two minutes of footage. But to shoot everything, he and Sam have to sit on the couches pretending to be charming and chill and confident instead of gnawing their own arm off like Dean secretly wants to do for just shy of four hours.

The format, at least, is pretty straight forward. Crowley talks to both of them together first, and then Sam has his private interview to answer questions and provide commentary on the selection of clips they show. Then it's Dean's turn, and second verse same as the first. At the end, Sam rejoins him on stage and questions are opened to the audience for the last twenty minutes.

Originally, they tried to do it the opposite way, starting the interview with Dean by himself, and then Sam, and then both of them together. That lasted for exactly one season before everyone realized that if they wanted anything from Dean besides nervous laughter and crass insults over Crowley's greasy suit and flamboyant tie, they need to let him warm up with Sam in the room.

He watches Sam's interview on a monitor backstage. Sacked out on one of the couches they provide, Sam's geniality shines through the screen. Sam is a natural at this by this point. He's sincere and warm, but not gushing. He gives tactful answers to the stranger or ruder questions, but never seems like he's deflecting. When his session ends, he always makes sure to thank not just Crowley and his team, but their crew on the show, their producers, and especially the audience for supporting them for twelve years.

Dean manages to achieve about twenty levels below Sam's effortless humbleness and cordial tone. Even with twelve years of doing this under his belt, he still tenses up as soon as Crowley volleys his first question. He gets defensive when Crowley comments on one of the clips they show, at the way Dean handled a particular altercation with one of the law enforcement officers they wound up deceiving on a hunt.

"Let me get this right. You're saying you think you're above the law?" Crowley questions, all smug and clever like he knows he's bullying Dean into a corner.

"N-no," Dean stumbles, shoving down the true answer that, yeah, given his expertise with these things and what hindrance the clueless local authorities can generate, he kind of thinks he is. Sometimes you have to break the rules to do what's necessary. "But sometimes them trying to do their job gets in the way of us doing our job, and when people's lives are at stake, sometimes we got to agree to disagree and do what needs to be done."

Crowley smirks, as if he knows just how that quote is going to sound in all the magazines the next morning. Crossing his legs, he flips to a new page on his clipboard. "What about this new legislation coming out? This—Supernatural Creatures Protection Act. You've had a poor history distinguishing between supernatural entities that prey on humans and the ones that, for lack of a better term, have turned vegan and source their food elsewhere, like blood banks or animal organs. If SCPA passes, will it make you rethink some of the—oh, ethics of your lifestyle? How do you respond to the criticism that you and your brother may be no better than vigilante serial killers?"

From the gleam in Crowley's eye, Dean knows he's been waiting to ask that exact question.

"I guess we'll deal with that hurdle when we come to it," he grates out through his locked jaw. "The Protection Act hasn't been passed yet."

It's not the best answer in the world. Sam is probably smacking his forehead backstage for how bloodthirsty and ruthless Dean sounds. But he can't talk about SCPA without talking about Cas, and how involved Cas is in that. How, without Cas, there wouldn't even be a bill being reviewed by Congress right now. Cas took all of his knowledge about hunting, and all his compassion for others like him, non-humans who either grew up with humans or who otherwise want recognition as legitimate members of society. It took a while for him to swallow Cas's picture of humans and the supernatural living as one big happy family, but nothing distracts Cas when he's set his mind to something. When he's driven for a cause he believes in. After a few hard shouting matches, it became difficult not to see Cas's point.

"And is that what you hope?" Crowley continues. "For it not to pass?"

Crowley's playing with him, like he's nothing more than a mouse caught at the end of a string, and with each question, Crowley reels him a little farther into his teeth.

It's just—it's too fucking much. He came here to do something, and it wasn't to talk about politics. But if that's how Crowley thinks he can get to him, then fine. Fucking fine.

Shifting on the couch, he angles his entire body at Crowley, legs splayed so he can lean on his elbow over the arm of the couch to invade Crowley's space.

"You want the real answer?"

There's only half a second that Crowley's face blanches, but Dean knows how much detail a camera can catch, especially the things you wish they wouldn't. He might be re-watching this tape for years to come, just for this moment.

"Why, Dean," Crowley purrs, trying to soothe himself back into the posture of a man at ease and in control. "Are you saying your answers up until now haven't been honest?"

"I'm saying that you don't get to talk shit about stuff you don't know." He points a finger at the A Camera. "And you're going to need a bleep there, CW." Turning back to Crowley, he pins him with his most intimidating stare. "My—my _boyfriend_ ," he gets out, proud of himself for not tripping too hard over the word. "You all know him. Cas. Castiel on the show. He's been a big supporter of SCPA since before it started. He's one of the reasons the paperwork got on all the congressmen's desks in the first place. He worked his ass off canvassing and campaigning, and he takes whatever little time and money he has available to introduce supernatural beings to like-minded others. He finds them safe houses. He finds people to work with them, to help them process stuff they been through, helps them to be less scared of humans.

"So yeah. I'd be damn proud if the politicians stop dicking around and pass that bill into law. I'd be damn proud of him. I don't care if that means I'm out of a job or the show ends. All I ever wanted to do when I started hunting was to help people. And Cas, Cas is actually out there doing it. He's—he's the best person I've ever known, human or non-human. So you should show him some goddamn respect."

 

* * *

 

The interview gets a little derailed after that. Crowley flips through his cue cards trying to find a follow-up question, but of course there aren't any. No one expected Dean's diatribe just now, not the production team, not Sam, and to be honest, not even Dean himself.

With a cue from his producer, Crowley signals for Sam to come back on stage so they can take questions from the audience. Dean's head is spinning, so bad he'd like nothing more than to stick it between his knees and maybe try breathing through a paper bag to help catch his breath. But it's out there now. He can't take it back. If given the choice, he wouldn't want to take it back. Sure, they might get flack and hate, and what does he know, maybe the whole show will come crashing down their ears and this half season will end with Porky Pig stuttering, "That's all folks!" But he can't bring himself to regret his outburst.

The first few Q and A questions pass over him in a fog. Luckily, Sam seems content to field them, perhaps noticing that Dean can't muster the ability to do more than stare panicked out into the distance, trying to wrap his head around the major shift his life just took. Hearing his name spoken shyly into a microphone is the only thing that finally gets through to him.

A girl stands in her seat, clutching the microphone with both hands like she's afraid she'll drop it. Her voice is breathy, obviously nervous to be speaking in front of such a large number of people. She looks young, somewhere between early 20s and late teens, so she probably doesn't have a lot of experience with public speaking yet. "My question is for Dean," she says, bowing her mouth close to the mic.

"Uh." It takes his brain a few seconds to boot up and come back online. He's still in public. Anything could happen at any moment. Her question could shatter him. "Yeah. Hi. What's your question?"

The girl's hands on the microphone go squeeze tighter and she begins to bounce a little on her toes. He has no idea if that's nerves or excitement. "Is it really true that you're dating Cas?"

Whatever questions he expected to receive tonight, that one never made the list. He usually gets a lot of random questions from these audience Q and A sessions. Stuff like what's his favorite—favorite color, favorite song, favorite place—and then other stuff like his opinion on things unrelated to him, the show, or anything that he's heard of before. It's weird, and sometimes he struggles to come up with a funny answer, but the audience questions always prove to be a nice reprieve from Crowley's version of therapy by torture.

This question, though—it might be the best one he's been asked. He starts to smile and the girl starts to bounce more, like she's sharing in the butterflies he has beating in his stomach. Like he's about to give her some fantastic present.

"Uh, yeah. Yeah, it's true." He opens his mouth to say more but the girl's squeal of delight drowns him out. It also makes him start to turn bright red. He can feel the heat in his cheeks even as they stretch to accommodate his grin. "We bought a house together a while ago, and yeah. It's great. He's great. He's—he's the love of my life."

A soft rumble of conversation erupts among the audience. Dean doesn't know if it's good or bad grumblings, but he almost doesn't care at this point. He keeps his eyes trained on the girl, the way she leans over to whisper to her friends and how they both giggle, almost glowing with how happy they look for him.

What would it mean if his news could make Cas as happy as they seem to be?

 

* * *

 

The producer on the floor allows for only a few more questions from the crowd before their time ends. Two of the questions focus on Dean's relationship with Cas—how did they meet, besides before the show, and what is the sweetest thing they've ever done for each other. Dean tells the couple stories he can think up quickly, absorbing the excitement from the audience until he feels nearly giddy himself, drunk with it.

By the time he's finally out of his trailer, clothes changed and makeup and hair product washed off, one desire dominates his thoughts. He needs to talk to Cas.

Some production company—he doesn't know if it's courtesy of their show or Crowley's—hired an SUV to ferry him and Sam to and from the hotel. It still feels weird to be chauffeured around, just like it still feels weird to find his face in magazines or segments on E! Entertainment News or have someone recognize him at a Gas N' Sip when all he wants to do is buy some beef jerky. Twelve years hasn't dulled any of the discomfort, nor the wish to simply slide into the Impala's driver's seat and speed down back roads with either his brother or Cas next to him. Just them and the open road and the anonymity that comes with it.

A lot of reality stars bitch that they hate the limelight, and then keep turning up years later on bullshit dance programs or those shows where they try to make you eat live spiders as if that somehow proves you're fated to be together as a couple. With him, he's dead serious when he says prefers the quiet life.

He first agreed to the show when they started on the insane chance that it might help keep Sam and Dad and them together, some kind of stronger glue to mend the ever-splitting cracks in their family. Money helped, too. Hunting pays shit. A lot of the time it takes all it can from you, and gives back only blood and broken bones. The money is still there, more in fact than when he started. But his primary motivation proved for fucking nothing, as any dedicated viewer could tell you. Dad still chose a deal with the devil rather than stick around with him. Sammy chose demon blood or the trials or a girl. His life's just one big cliché. Everyone knows that reality television breaks up families more than it keeps them together.

If someone asked him years ago why he kept doing the show, he wouldn't have been able to give them an answer. Habit, he might have said. _Self-punishment_ , echoes a voice in his head that sounds suspiciously like Cas. Neither answer is the truth.

After Dad died, and after Hell, he didn't know what he wanted. But there was Cas. Doing the show meant seeing Cas, and let him keep seeing Cas. Cas, as it turned out, was the glue he'd been looking for all that time. Cas holds him together, and through that, holds him and Sam together. No way in hell would he have been cool with Sam moving out of the bunker to move in with Eileen. No way in hell would he have driven himself as hard to get out of Purgatory. Cas probably isn't the first person to love him—he knows Sam does, and Bobby did, and he wants to believe Dad did as well—but Cas is the first person where he can feel it.

Staring into Cas's eyes is like trying to stare down a hurricane, some force of nature too big and too much and too powerful for Dean's puny human body to withstand. And in the center of that hurricane he knows is him. It's all for him. It turns for him. It's fucking terrifying, of course. But it's damn hard to dismiss, to pretend it's not real.

Outing himself on national television isn't anything close to that in measure, to the things Cas has done for him and the things Cas will continue to do for him in the future. But he wants Cas to look at him and see what he sees when he looks at Cas, pale in comparison as it might be. Something that says you're loved. Without question. Beyond disbelief. Maybe this can be that first small step in the right direction.

 

* * *

 

As soon as the door to his hotel room swings closed behind him, he's flopped on his bed with his phone in his hand. Sam suggested in the car that they hit one of the food carts in Times Square. It's been a tradition since they started coming to New York that Dean has to get himself a New York style hot dog or four. Neither of them has eaten all day, not more than the coffee and stale pastries provided to them backstage, so by rights he should be starving. He probably is, somewhere beneath the giddy-anxiety flipping his stomach like he's riding a roller coaster, but all that can wait.

Nothing's going to stop Cas coming first now.

His phone doesn't register any missed calls or messages. He tries not to let that deter him. Even if Cas skipped out on the trip this time, he's done this enough himself to know the basic schedule. It's rare Cas attempts to call him when he knows Dean is filming, not unless Dean instigates it first. He tries to ignore the niggling anxiety that Cas might start to apply that rule to all aspects of Dean's life. That unless Dean requests his presence, Cas has no place to do the reaching out. That he'll be there whenever Dean needs him, but he's not allowed to expect the favor returned.

It's not true. It never was. Dean's an idiot.

The phone rings through to the automated voice asking him to leave a message. He tries a second time, and then a third and a fourth, but whatever Cas is doing clearly doesn't involve wanting to answer his phone.

He can't be angry with Cas for that. He can't be, because Cas has every right to his own life, to see to his own needs.

He tries again another time twenty minutes later, lying on his back and listening to his stomach grumble its complaints of hunger. This time the ring cuts to the robot woman's voice way too soon. Cas hit the ignore button.

The buzz of an incoming text sounds while he still has the phone frozen to his ear, swallowing down waves of panic. He just told the world he has an awesome boyfriend, and what if now he's going to need to release some press statement to the effect of, _Nope, sorry, spoke too late_.

sry for nt answering bt i dnt want to b yelled at today, the screen reads. A second message appears above it a moment later. or b the audience for one of yr exorcisms of self-hatred + guilt. u hve a tv show for that

And yeah, okay. That's not uncalled for. The last text Dean sent was maybe a little—overboard.

I just want you to be happy, he writes back after he thinks about how to say it. I want to be able to MAKE YOU happy. I want to be what you need.

Cas's response comes quick. u do, Dean. u always hve

It's something he's noticed before, but it hits him all over again lying in his empty hotel room with Cas nothing more than a few words on the screen. The only word Cas ever capitalizes is his name.

I miss you. That's all he can think to say. It's what's most true, at any rate.

youll b home soon

Come to New York. I got a photo shoot for the promo tomorrow morning, but my afternoon's free and my flight back isn't until Sunday night. We can do whatever you want.

It takes a long time for his phone to show a reply. Cas has his phone set so the other person can't see when he's typing a response. Dean has never hated that feature more than right now. He has no idea if Cas is writing him a diatribe or if Cas has just shut off his phone and abandoned the conversation.

Finally, after years where Dean has to squash the urge to text hello? eight thousand times, a new message zooms onto the screen.

whtever i want is u. yr it. youve always been it. i dnt think im v good at being happy. i dnt think u are either tbh. we dnt hve to b perfect, Dean. i know my limits and i think i know yrs. im ok w that. can u b?

No. At least not anymore. He never would've been okay with it in the first place if he knew that was the deal. He sends his answer and then blacks the screen on his phone, turning his face away to bury it in the pillows.

It dings a second later with another message from Cas.

then i cnt come to ny. im sry

"Yeah," he sighs to nobody and nothing.

 

* * *

 

He falls asleep like that, still dressed and angled on top of the covers. He didn't even get around to taking his boots off. It's not the smartest decision in the whole world. Photo shoot days don't just mean looking your best, but like you're the best-looking in the whole universe. Staggering in light-headed from hunger with pillow creases on his face and puffy, red eyes, and the makeup girls are going to think he spent the night on a bender. Blinking open his eyes unwillingly against the pink, pre-dawn light, he kind of feels like that's exactly what he did. His stomach burns and his head throbs, and he doesn't have Cas. Not Cas the way he wants to have him.

He didn't draw the blinds before he fell asleep, so he has a clear view of the New York skyline through the window. Judging by the sun, the only positive aspect of this whole ordeal is that he didn't oversleep. Like the stupid fuck up he is, he forgot to set his alarm as well.

Trudging into the bathroom, he brushes his teeth and gets halfway through washing his face in the half-hope it'll make him look human when the pounding starts on the door. He doesn't know who the fuck it could be, and he doesn't care, so he elects to let them figure out they're unwanted in their own time. He doesn't want to talk to anyone.

Whoever the person is, they have to be the most stubborn bastard on the face of the planet because they just keep knocking. "Room service!" a voice eventually shouts.

"Didn't order any, fuckhead!" Dean shouts right back, shuffling to his suitcase to pick out something better than yesterday's smelly shirt and jeans.

" _Dean_ ," comes a suddenly very recognizable growl. "Just open the fucking door."

That sounds like Cas. Except it can't be. Cas is in Kansas, not speaking to him, all because Dean wants to be a better boyfriend and Cas has settled for the fact Dean can't be.

"Dean."

And yeah. That's definitely Cas. Cas, who, twelve hours ago, said he definitely wasn't coming to New York.

"Dean. Please," Cas says again, quieter this time, almost a plea.

Jesus, Dean's missed him. He's about to throw open the door and haul Cas inside, wrap him up and kiss him and tell him he's sorry or he's stupid or whatever Cas wants to hear. Whatever Cas needs so things can go back to normal. Whatever it will take to make Cas stay. He needs him. He needs Cas making weird jokes Dean doesn't get and getting stubborn and defiant over causes Dean's never considered before and glaring and sulking in the mornings until he drinks all of Dean's coffee. He's fucking _missed_ him.

He wants to say all of that when he yanks open the door, but what comes out of his mouth instead is, "Son of a bitch, how do you find this shit so quickly?"

Because instead of being greeted with a hug or a kiss or a punch to the nose, Cas is holding this week's copy of IN TOUCH magazine up to Dean's face. In the bottom corner, a circle cropped photo of Dean from a few years ago sits next to the headline: NEW ROMANTICS: DEAN WINCHESTER CONFIRMS DATING RUMORS—AND IT'S NOT WHO YOU'D EXPECT.

"Google," Cas deadpans, like that really matters right now. "It came out today. I read it online this morning, but then at the airport, I saw a copy and I bought it to show you because I know you have an aversion to any music or technology that came out after 1979."

"Hey, _Coda_ was 1982 and that was, you know, all right," Dean defends on autopilot.

Cas narrows his eyes at him, looking a little like he's imagining plastering tape over Dean's mouth so he can't talk anymore. Dean kind of wishes he would.

"Uh. I mean." He swallows and steps back. "Do you want to . . . come in?"

The glare stays on him as Cas brushes passed him through the door. He doesn't even need to hear it to know Cas wants to say he caught what must have been a last minute redeye to New York once he read about the interview, but only with the intention of loitering outside Dean's room for the next two days. His mouth goes all wobbly as a flood of affection washes through him.

Cas comes to a stop in front of the bed, inspecting the mussed pillows and wrinkled bed cover. "You didn't sleep in the bed?" he asks, sliding an accusatory glance over his shoulder at Dean.

"No, I did! Just—more _on_ it, than _in_ it."

"But you're doing photos this morning." Cas frowns. "Did you at least take your shoes off this time?"

"Yes," he protests, but when Cas lifts his chin in challenge, Dean relents. "No."

"You sleep terribly that way," Cas says, and accomplishes the thing Dean's only ever seen Cas able to do. He manages to look both aggravated and anguished all packed into one tiny half-expression.

Dean jams his hands into his pockets and suddenly finds the carpet fascinating. "Yeah, well. Guess I had a lot on my mind." He shrugs.

"Me," Cas surmises. He drops down onto the edge of the bed. With a tilt of his head, he invites Dean to sit down next to him. "You told the world about me," he says, when Dean settles next to him. "About—us."

"Yeah."

"But . . ." Cas's eyebrows pull together, wrinkling his brow until it forms a divot at the top of his nose. "You hate people knowing personal information about you. You hate being vulnerable."

As if having one resident armchair psychologist in Sam wasn't enough, he had to go and fall in love with Dr. Freud here. The worst part is that Cas knows him well enough that he's not wrong.

"Yeah. Well," he says again. Somehow this is harder to admit now, in private, to the one person who most needs to hear it, than it was up on that stage with Crowley and two hundred strangers watching. "This was more important." He forces down the lump in his throat with a swallow. "You're more important."

Then Cas's hands are on his face, and he's being kissed, soft and tender and soothing. He hasn't cried the whole time they've been having this stupid fight, but the way Cas is kissing him tugs a warning hitch from his chest.

"Dean . . ."

"No." He grabs Cas's wrists to push him back, pushes together the courage to look him in the eye. "You got to know why I did it."

"I never asked you to."

"But I wanted you to!" he snaps, physically jerking Cas a little. "I want you to ask me things like that. I want you to—to know that you can. That I'll do it. You come first. Always, man."

Cas is already shaking his head and opening his mouth like he's going to respond, but Dean overrides him.

"No. I'm—I'm . . . So maybe you're bad at being happy. Maybe we both are. Okay. But you make me happier than I ever thought I could be. And every day, you make me happier than that all over again. That's what I want to do for you. I don't want to—settle. I don't want good enough. If I'm doing something you don't like, then fucking just—fucking _tell me_. Push back at me."

"So many people have pushed at you your whole life," Cas whispers, heartsick. "I don't want to be like them."

"You're not," Dean swears, and this time the sob that's been waiting does come out. "You're nothing like them, God, Cas—. You're strong and badass and fucking hot. And that's what you do. That's what you've always done. You push at me. We push at each other. Since the first time we met in that barn—"

"Second time," Cas interjects.

" _Second_ time we met, then. You come at me—with all you got. And you can handle it when I come at you with all I got. You make me better. So—push me to be better for you."

Cas keeps staring at him, not that blank stare from before, but one that makes Cas look—lost. Young. Like Dean just upended his entire worldview. Still holding onto Cas's wrists, he pulls Cas in against his chest, winding his arms around him and letting Cas tuck his face into Dean's neck.

"I can't be happy if you're not happy," he murmurs against Cas's temple. "That's . . . that's what love is, okay?"

It takes a moment but eventually he feels Cas nod against his shoulder. "Okay, Dean."

He can't tell if he was in some kind of shock all this time, but the relief is slow to trickle in. Slowly, slowly, his shoulders slope down, leaking their tension. His chest feels less constricted, the air sliding in deeper with each breath. Cas slips in closer, chest to chest, their knees tangling together on the bed as they stretch out together.

"I really fucking hated those tabloids actually," Cas says at some point, and Dean laughs.

"We'll give them something to write about now," he jokes, and tumbles them sideways so he can kiss Cas, deep and perfect and best of all, real.

**Author's Note:**

> A quote from Mango while beta'ing: _how does one handle a show when the star is in hell for a few months? (OH HELLATUS RITE NVM)_


End file.
